We desire to present them with a picture of the inmost emotions of the times--of the living, breathing actions and passions of the people of the doomed Empire.

Antiquarian topography and classical architecture we leave to abler pens, and resign to other readers.
It is, however, necessary that the sphere in which the personages of our story are about to act should be in some measure indicated, in order to facilitate the comprehension of their respective movements.
That portion of the extinct city which we design to revive has left few traces of its existence in the modern town.

Its sites are traditionary--its buildings are dust.

The church rises where the temple once stood, and the wine-shop now lures the passing idler where the bath invited his ancestor of old.
The walls of Rome are in extent, at the present day, the same as they were at the period of which we now write.

But here all analogy between the ancient and modern city ends.